Update from Dec 17. Birthday

I can never tell if I'm going to write too much when I start a blog post. This time there's a lot to be said.
I haven't said much in a while, I've had a birthday, and several holiday celebrations.
What to start with?

I had a great birthday, surrounded by friends and family. It was great. I finally got back in contact with several old friends that make my life much better. I made a LOT of sushi and invited some people over. I might have been the first time we had so many people in my apartment. Here's the dessert sushi we made from twinkies, fruit roll ups and swedish fish!
I spent my 22nd birthday shopping with my Mom and Grandma.
I'm not one for clothes much but I was able to get several shirts in different colors. I'm a bit like a cartoon character in that I like to have several of the exact same thing in different colors. After a day shopping we gathered at my Mom's house for spaghetti (my favorite) and pin the tail on the donkey. Fun times.
It was great and relaxed being around all these people. I had a really great time with my friends. I can't think of too many "great thoughts" to post about the goings on but it was good and I felt special.

Sometimes I'm a little crazy.

And I accidentally posted just the title a moment ago... Hopefully I can post the entire blog this time...

Not really sure where to start, it's been a long time since I worked on my blogging skills.
Alas. Here goes.

My husband and I watched a really good TED talks Friday night. Dr. Ramachandran is one of my favorite scientists.

He wrote Phantoms of the Mind which blew me out of the water and really made me realize how much I love science. So all this geekiness, could be attributed to his amazing research.

Anyway. During his speech he brings up synesthesias. John thought they were fascinating. I casually commented, "Yea, didn't you wonder why September is always blue and red?"

Oops. He didn't know I was a grapheme-synestehsia. To be honest I didn't either until my freshman psych class (oh the things we learn about ourselves in college)
I didn't know other people didn't do this matching colors to letters/numbers thing. I also do it with people and days of the week.
So he had be write a list. Of all the numbers, days of the week, letters, and people we know.
I had never really thought about it before so writing it all out was kinda difficult.

The hardest part was I didn't have enough colors in my marker box. Several times I just couldn't FIND the number. I would draw a blank like I couldn't remember the number that came next. The first time it happened was with 5. 5 is a like a pale orange/dark yellow. I only had bright yellow. I figured it out once I darkened the shade a bit. But the HARDEST was 7. I stopped at 6 and couldn't think anymore. It was the strangest thing. I couldn't remember the next number. Sure I knew 789. I was POSITIVE 9 was coming, it's red and almost the exact red I have in my marker box. My mind was SCREAMING,
"Just move on. 9 is right here! Forget about whatever you're looking for. Just draw 9! This orange is close to 8 so you can make it work. 9 is really important. You HAVE to draw 9!"
In another part of my mind I could hear,
"Forget about 7, draw 9 and come back to 7 later. Lie about 7, John won't know anyway and it can get you to 9 faster. It's ok, no one will know. Besides this is your brain chemsitry how will anyone find out. You can't be wrong, just skip it. How do you know 7 even really exists? It's all made up anyway to keep humans happy. Just an arbitrary number, you can get by without it."

It was kinda freaky. I knew this wasn't normal for most people but I'd never really dealt with it. It always just was. I had never had the experience of rationalizing that 7 didn't exist.

Then it hit me.
7 is White.

Yay! Birthday early!

Let the fabulous begin!
I have before me something wonderful. Something great. Something shiny and small. It's something every girl has ever wanted. (At least this girl.)
Seriously, I have the best husband.
He got me a netbook!

Not only that, he didn't tell me when it came in, but he charged it, loaded it up, gave it more RAM. THEN told me it was here!
What a thoughtful person.

Let's hope this make my life easier instead of harder. Hopefully I can blog not without all the crazy hassle I normally go though. (Sigh.)

Not like much of this is incredibly important, but it's exciting and I'm happy.
A lot has happened to me that I wish I had be able to share with everyone, but alas. I didn't take the time to do so.

So here goes, a new era of computing.
It's so little!

I call her Evee.

Geocites = sadface

Well, it's curtains for geocites. http://ping.fm/bWXRK

If you're around my age, chances are you had a geocites account, complete with incredibly too long to remember web address. This was in the time before short links too! Geocities was like a precursor to myspace. Or sort of.
My geocites account was something like, "The Midget Rebellion" that was the name of pretty much every half-completed webpage I tried to design as a small child. I used geocities to pretend to be an artist. Boy, was I a poor impersonator. I had a home page which could link to "about me," "gallery," and "favorite links," The gallery was the hardest part, I made a bunch of thumbnails and linked to the larger image. Pretty much standard stuff, but it took forever on my parents old computer. Dial-up on a secondary phone line. Sigh, the good old days.
I think I'll miss the fact that it's gone now. I've probably destroyed all the originals of the "art" I produced at ages 11-15. Now the digital copies are gone as well. *sniff sniff*
Goodbye old friend, I spent several hours trying to get my links to light up in flashing rainbow fonts. You will be missed.

Past Medical History includes...

I feel bad for this person, but their PMH included
"high anal hurneeas"

Sigh...

Complaint of the Day

Chief complaint of the day.

"Alien's poisoned meds"

I love my job.

I love my job.
We are having a trauma day training ER docs, I get to be a motorcycle
accident with a depressed skull fracture, open femur fracture, left
wrist and ankle deformity.
Wowza! I'm all kinds of screwed up.
All have done great and it's really helpful to hear their thought
process as well. Good training on both ends of the spectrum!
I'm loving the Cspine precautions and antibiotics I'm receiving. Makes
me smile!

Sent from my iPhone

testing the facebook app....

There are a couple of things I truly, enjoy in life. Grey weather, hoodies, cats, cereal, etc. Well all of them came together this morning in an honestly perfect way.

Then two of my favorites got even better.

Coffee and Wired Magazine.
I'm a fairly simple girl and this months issue of Wired breaks down the chemistry of coffee.
Yum!
Benefits of coffee?
caffeine, no cockroaches, flu-fighting base, antioxidants, cavity prevention, vitamin B3.

What's not to love?

Sometimes you wonder...

Today I watched a recently discharged drunk patient quietly load up
his gear onto the Doctor's motorcycle and attempt to push it out of
the parking lot. Needless to say security stopped him.

Sent from my iPhone

New news update on H1N1 from medscape!

New news update on H1N1 from medscape!
Basically, Paula Moyer is saying that people need to get vaccinated!
The good news is that so far the virus is genetically stable. No
mutations = no extra or booster shots = happy me!

That's about all for now. Playing the game Pandemic really gets me
thinking about hand washing!

Sent from my iPhone

Mandatory Misinformation

The H1N1 vaccine isn't mandatory, so to speak, but it's pretty dang hard to get around getting it.

Pushing for vaccine

In essence, the policy states that if you don't get it and fall ill during the flu season you cannot come to work for 7 days and cannot take sick pay or vacation pay during this time. A pretty serious threat to some people. Luckily, I'm not one of them. <- link to bank account broken ;)

It's a free shot that will protect you and your patients and the thing most people are worried about is the fact that their employer is "infringing on their rights."

This new vaccine is made the same way as the old flu shots and in 95% of patients elicits an effective antibody response!

I guess what makes me mad is this makes me realize that I'm working with people who would rather take a stand on principles that don't matter than protect their families and their patients.
Yea, so what if you're "relatively healthy" and have "never gotten the flu" this strain is affecting healthy young adults. Also, H1N1 is not severe for healthy young adults but is for the elderly and those with co-morbid conditions. If you're a health care worker who do you think you'll be caring for? Could you possibly be a carrier without exhibiting signs of H1N1?

Email blog update #1

I know, I'm enough of a geek I should have figure this out a long time
ago... Hey, I've been busy!
Speaking of all that jazz. I got the job in the ER. I went from extern
to intern and all the glory that entails. I've seen some pretty cool
stuff, unfortunately, I can't remember it all/don't want to make a
megapost.

I'm almost done with my internship as well. It last for 500 hours,
then you're "on your own" or at least as on your own as it gets in our
ER. They are very good about teamwork.
Anyway, I'll have to give more on that later.
It's dinner time..

Sent from my iPhone

Testing the phone

Testing my from iphone blogging abilities!!

If this works it will be a whole new world of all CxJvak opinion all
the time. Something this world desperately needs. ;)

Sent from my iPhone

The less I have to do, the less gets done.

Blerg... Since I finished school I have been so lazy.

There are several things I want to do in my life. I've done none of them since I finished school three weeks ago.

Our speaker for the pinning ceremony (which really deserves a blog of it's own it was so great) was our amazing classmate Joe. He did a truly amazing job. I really will remember it my entire career.
Joe (among other things) challenged us a lot. While most people could, would and sometimes should be cynical of a graduation speech, because this was Joe, I listened and took it to heart.
Everyday do something that scares you
Every week ask someone for help
Every month well, crap, that one I did forget...
Every year do something that changes the world.

I think I could remember most of them, because I already had plans for what I was going to do to help me achieve those goals.

Sadly, I've been ridiculously lazy since graduation. I mean, I've had all the time in the world and I've listened to meager podcasts, read almost no journals, barely even glanced at my magazine subscriptions, and well. You can see my blogs for yourself. *Bare*

It hasn't been bad at all though. I've got to spend time with my kitten, Spock, and my husband, Ewiggen. Plus, my brother got married.
I've just been lazy professionally.

Now, if you'll excuse me I'm going to go shoot some Zombies with my husband now.
*Left 4 Dead!*
w00t

Dr. Dasovich Arrested at DC protest

Dr. Judy is the assistant Medical Director of the Kitchen Medical Clinic. I spent the past year or so working at Bill's Place in a free clinic run by Missouri State Nursing students. I haven't had too many run-ins with Dr. Judy but I can tell you one thing, she's passionate. So her arrest doesn't surprise me.

The Kitchen Medical Clinic has been on the verge of closing for the past 6 months or so. Friends of mine did their clinicals there. They've been working to keep it open/relocate the patients. These patients are not Medicare/Medicaid approved and have no insurance. This clinic is free and the medications are cheap or free. It's an amazing service to these people who would otherwise die or clog up ERs all the time. As of a few days ago the Clinic decided to stay open. They were due to close in July. So even though I don't have all the details about what exactly was going on, on first impulse I am not too shocked by Dr. Judy's reaction. I just wish it had not occurred.

Here's the CSPAN on youtube.

I love the part when the protesters demand equal representation an Baucus laughs and requests more police.

Here's kind of an interesting video.

They're arguing single payer (like Canada, New Zealand, Japan and Australia have)

Weird stuff. Kinda scary. So health care for all would be great, but the worst part of this is the complete lack of democracy. Fair treatment has to start with fair representation.

And the Moral of the Story is...
It doesn't matter if I agree with someone's statement, they should still be able to state it. If I can't refute someone's argument are my beliefs/facts/opinions correct? If I can refute they're argument then why am I afraid to let them speak?

That's all for now...

Uniforms

National uniforms for nurses were voted in favor (76%) in England.

I think this is a good idea.
So I'm not advocating for all white dresses or little hats. That stereotype has gone the way of the... well... look at the picture.

However, the hospital is a confusing place. Very confusing. You've got all kinds of people running around and in an emergency a family member, (or newbie) can't tell a nurse from a housekeeper (a mistake that was made very often on my floor.)

Color-coding people I think is the best way to go.
I'm not just saying this to make it easier on me when I get dressed in the morning. But, I'm all for uniforms, I like knowing what to wear and what to look like. I have nothing against it.

Of course, my personality is strong enough it doesn't have to be shown through my clothing....

I say this while websurfing for good deals on all black scrubs. That's what I was told the ER nurses wear at my facility. Woo hoo!

So it's Nurses' Week, eh?

Don't mind my cynicism but Nurses' Week sucks.

Doesn't this degrade us from Professionals if we have to have our own special week?
I feel I repeat the movie the Incredibles when I say, if everybody is special then no one is.

I can't get really hyped up over Nurses' Week. It feels like a cop out.

I'd never actually seen this...

Wow, there are some things you can find on the internet that you never think you'll see in real life.
Like most Reddit articles.
Pictures of crazy train wrecks. Really bad women drivers. Etc.


Well, I had never seen one of these instances in really life until I left Wal-Mart yesterday.This van was PACKED with trash! I could hardly believe it. Ewiggen and I had to drive around it about three times to take it all in. Every inch of this van was filled. McDonald's, Wendy's, Burger King. It was all there. Sam's Club sized boxes of M&Ms, Vanilla Wafers, Recepts, newspapers... Wow. It was... impressive.
As we drove off Ewiggen said that HAD to be a mental disorder.

The only "clear" spot in the car was the driver's seat. I almost wanted to wait and see who came out to the van!

Free Chicken?

It seems that Oprah really liked KFC's chicken sandwich or whatever. (Chicken Fiasco?)
Well, she offered a free downloadable coupon. Free stuff is always good.

Ewiggen (my husbandman) works at a library. People at libraries really like free stuff. That's why they go to libraries instead of bookstores. So many people were downloading this coupon the computers were freezing. Plus those computers really are not the best at Java heavy pages.

So, his solution? Print off a lot of the coupons that could be picked up at the Reference desk.
For $0.10 that is.
Nothing is ever really free.

Turn for the awesome

So my life has definitely taken a turn for the awesome.
I'm on break now. No work for a month, very little school. Just basically I get to sit around and do wth I want. All the time.

So what I'm I doing? Running. Lots of running. This is actually a great treat for me. I love to run, but never get the chance to. I'm a pretty good wuss. I don't like treadmills because I have very high arches that can't handle the flat board. I can't run outside because of my allergies or asthma. I change my mind quite frequently in the middle of things so I don't want to be in the middle of nowhere and suddenly remember I have something else to do. So I've been having a lot of fun with my Wii fit. I've already run for an hour today. Something I have to say I actually feel blessed to get the opportunity to do. On a totally girly side note, as of Monday I lost the 20lbs I gained in nursing school.

Anyway. Not a vast amount of nursing updates. I am however looking for more ways to get involved with Sigma Theta Tau and have started examining Masters and Ph.D programs. Determining what I need to do what I want to do. So many options, so little time... sigh.

I have a cat now. Mr. Spock, he's cute and sweet and already trained. I love cats. He peed in the floor once, got swatted, shown the litter box and has nailed it every time. Last night I thought I had squished him in my sleep, but when I started petting him he purred for the first time. Sounded more like ice in a blender next door than a purr but he's only 7 weeks old.

Geek updates out the wazoo. (Yes, that's medical) Star Trek movie tomorrow. I have tickets for an early showing. I'm going with a gang of people and yes, we all have uniforms. I'm very stoked. My Dad, (where my Trekkie genes come from) is probably more excited than I am. He's getting to go see this movie with a bunch of college students all dressed up and geeking out. It probably takes him back to his college days.

I like podcasts.
Normally I have a pretty set standard of what I listen to when. Nature Podcast is for cleaning the house, Steve Eley's Escape Pod for running, 20 minute yoga for stress, Infectious Disease in the car or surfing the web. Now I've started listening to Cory Doctorow's Craphound. I backed up to the beginning of his short story "Someone Comes to Town, Someone Leaves Town." I'm on section 003 and it's darn good. Oh yea, sorry Steve, but it replaced your running today. Don't worry I'll probably catch up with you later when I run this afternoon.

I think I'll turn my next rambling into it's own post. Otherwise this will be too hefty to enjoy.

Late Entries (Sheesh, I'm Lazy)

Wow, I feel kind of bad that I haven't updated in a long while...
Lets think of what's happened in that time frame.
Oh yea, a LOT. This will probably be best spread out over a few posts.

Late Entry April 24

Relay for Life! What a fun time. We camped out and sold a few baked goodies. I was the silly one and brought health food. Pita bread with honey and butter. I actually sold a few, next to the rice crispy treats and sugar cookies. It was a good time. We (the senior nursing class) camped next to the juniors and we all got together and played Catch Phrase. It really was a blast. Some of the things we all came up with... "Five fingered win?"
Probably the best moment of the night was when we played the NCLEX review board game.
That was pretty sweet.


April 25th
I had the chance to hang out with one of my favorite professors and help with a textbook. A few of us in the class had the "honor" to write test bank questions for a book she's writing. Lots of fun. I found out that Mandy is a lot more (Mandy, up there) like me than I thought she was. Scary almost. I knew she was awesome but when I got to her house met her four cats (all with Irish names) and saw her Star Wars bobble head collection, that settled it. She's very awesome. (Me >)
I remember my second semester one of the nurses made the comment it was so nice I could learn nursing from my older sister.

Blech, I need to take a break. EWiggen just woke up. I'll write some more catch-ups later

I think I'm getting inspired...

I think I'm getting inspired by rdfraiser's website Nursing Ideas

He makes videos interviewing nurses. I like it. Maybe I could start working on some sort of video biography of nurses. I know I had talked about making skills videos. I'm still interested in doing that, just looking for an outlet to get that done through (I don't actually have the supplies just laying around!)

I don't know, I just want something cool to do. I'm scared once I'm done with school I might get bored just sitting around.

Late Entry- Wednesday April 22

Yet again, I have been lazy.
Well, I don't get my blog time on Wednesdays. Ewiggen and I get home at the same time and I hate sitting on the computer when we could do stuff together. So here was yesterday's experience, and boy oh boy it was.

First good bit of the day. I got to stop someone's heart with adenosine.
Good times. He called the ambulance for Supraventricular Tachycardia and the EMS gave him some on the way over. So we monitored him then sent him home. Four hours later, he came back. So we monitored him again. Right as he was leaving he asked for me to check his pulse. I grabbed his wrist, but couldn't get a good reading, so I hooked him back up to the pulse oximiter.
247 bpm.
That's a little fast. So we hooked him back up to all the monitors and warmed up the difibrilator, started yet another Iv (third stick of the day), and pushed some adenosine. It was fun. To be honest, it was the first time I got to see a cardioversion. I liked it.


I will say it again, preceptors make all the difference. The day seems to drag on when you get a poor preceptor and speed by when you have a good one.
Just in case anyone reading this ever gets the chance to be a preceptor. I'll give you a few tips.
Communicate well. Don't antagonize or baby your shadow. Speak directly and give directions. The person is shadowing you because they've never done what you're doing before. Teach them the BEST way to do something, not the way you do it or the fastest way. Do things according to the hosptial's policy. Explain as you go, or explain before and let them do it. Always be encouraging. And number one rule I would say. Don't ever leave them alone.

Not that I'm ranting for a particular reason.

I'm finding myself at a loss for... compassion?

Here's a bit of an interesting article.


It talks about nurses losing their compassion within two years of working. Eep. That's not long.
I can understand where it's coming from. From a conversation earlier with another Student Nurse friend. She's claiming the need to take the summer completely off and not look for work until August.
Of course I was shocked. 1) How would she survive her student loans without a job and 2) Was this even an option?

It makes sense though. We are all so burned out from school (and I thought it might just be our school) but we really don't give much of a care about what happens. Through school I was conditioned to just get it done, because then it's over. Oh sure I started all nice nice and wanting to do well and wanting to be this nice awesome person for all those sick and afflicted but after I got my face handed to me for not getting some things perfect academically or "professionally" I stopped caring so much and started focusing on getting things over with.
I guess it transfers over.
When too much red tape or poor politics get involved people just want to get things done and on with their lives. Same with nursing. It can turn into a job that one hates, really, really fast.

Think about it.

You're dealing with sick, most of the time, stupid and lazy people. Being an intelligent, diligent, hard working nurse (because you HAVE to be) this will grate on your nerves after a while. Then, if you have to deal with ego-complexed doctors who make it their life's goal to prove how superior they are things only get worse. Add the administration hounding you about cutting costs, and infection control harping about safety and you have a good summation of just the bare facts of how annoying things can get. (Not to mention short staffing, working holidays, interpersonal conflicts or all the poo and vomit.)

After a while you depersonalize just so you can "go to work."
This is why I am so stoked to have the job I have. I love it there. They are so supportive. I can tell this won't become just a job to me. Knowing I am analytically minded I constantly have to bring the "human" element back into my care. It takes conscious effort, but that is, as my favorite professor and all time genius Deb Savinske said, "That's the ART and SCIENCE of nursing."

Another one bites the dust

Yay! Finished another clinical day. One more to go then done!!

Today was much better than last week. I had a great preceptor. See, who you're stuck with makes all the difference. I've had a different preceptor each week at clinicals. I'm the only one on my floor who has this problem. Sigh. Whatev~
Not that I terribly enjoyed my day, but it was better than normal. I caught some med errors and showed my nurse a cool trick I learned in the ER with tubes and air.

If you've got a bag that ran dry (therefore sucking air halfway down the tube) and you're going to hang a new bag, spike the new bag, pinch below a port, hook up a syringe and draw the air out into the syringe. If you've got some fluids in there, pull them out too. Then (now, pinching above the port) push the fluids back into the patient. Ta-da! Air in line fixed.

Wow, that makes me want to start a webcast of cool nursing tricks I've picked up...

I don't want to start on my paperwork now, and it's a really pretty day.
For now I think I'll change into shorts and go for a bike ride.
Maybe more, and more important stuff later. I've got some UV rays to absorb!

April is almost over.

Ta-da!
Sigma Theta Tau- Lambda Theta chapter new inductees! BabyOrthoNurse (blogger) is not pictured. I don't know where she was, but she's in it too. I had to wait to get this photo from my dad but, we look a bit like a cell phone commercial, with our vertical assent.


Another day in the ER. Just three days left of my Externship. Wow, it's gone too fast. I'm a little scared to think that in a month I'll be an Intern and have more responsibility and autonomy, but I'm looking forward to it.

Today, I felt was a blah day. I didn't feel like I was at my best. However, at the end of the day my preceptor (Jacob) asked me how I felt. So I was honest. So was she. She took me aside and said that she felt today was one of my best days. I was more autonomous, had more patients, prioritized them well, etc. Really boosted my confidence. Looking back, she was right. I did a lot on my own. It's just a little fragmented because we'll both do things separate so I don't get that entire flow in my head. I reported to a nurse on another floor for the first time. I'd never called report before and for some reason I was terrified. We got really busy and I just decided to do it on my own. Then I took them upstairs on my own. I was scared but... I did it. So there.
My only regret is that my batting average is going way down. I've missed so many IVs recently. They keep blowing or missing, all these old people I'm getting. I can't get a good stick in any of them. It will just take getting my confidence back. I mean, after all I started a 16 g in someone a week ago and that went just fine.

I'll never see another man as happy to tell me he has brain cancer as a patient I had today. He was so excited about it too...

In other news, one of my favorite podcasts is back (or at least I remembered to update)
The PUSCAST.
If you don't listen to Mark Crislip you should. He's funny, sarcastic, and provides excellent reviews of infectious disease literature. He's got a blog I should look into now that I'm doing this whole blogging thing myself.

I came home today to find a small box on the desk with my name on it.
Ewiggen likes to get things for free online.
Today he gave me two sets of Magic the Gathering Cards... Random, but thanks.

One more picture and side note.This is Spock.

He will soon be MY KITTEH! I have wanted a kitten ever since I had to put my two cats to sleep a few years back. Now I finally have the chance. Ewiggen and I have been talking about this a long time. I am so excited. I can hardly wait to take him home. Sunday the 26th... So happy.

Late Entry #2- Saturday the 18th

I normally wouldn't post about nursing on a Saturday. I haven't worked Saturdays in a while, but I have great news.

Yesterday I was inducted into SIGMA THETA TAU!
It's an international Nursing Honor Society. They only took the top 1/3 of our class, (in a class of 38 that's amazing for me) and we had to have a least a 3.0 GPA. Man, oh man.
Honestly, I've wanted this ever since I started nursing school. I went and researched a bunch of stuff. Being interested mostly in research I found that Sigma Theta Tau was the group to join. I worked so hard and when I got that first "B" I of course was devastated and mentally took my self out of the running. I also thought it was awarded to you your junior year and when that came and went, I changed my career mentality. But I was WRONG! Never so happy to be wrong!
Yay! I did it! I'm in! So happy... sigh.
My Dad has photos, so uploads later.

I almost missed it though. Recovering from the night before (see previous post) I slept until my husband's alarm went off at 830. Eep, the induction started at 900. I have never looked so good in such a short amount of time. So, I made it. On time even. There were poster presentations set up and I read a few interesting bits of research I believe mostly the sophomore prenursing majors were doing. (I'll never understand why they make you take nursing research before you learn anything about nursing. Shrug.) I made idle chit-chat with those at my table, previous members. (I was the only inductee at my place) We discussed my plans post graduation. It's been fuzzy to me as EWiggen and I have waited to hear from MedSchool, but basically. Work the ER, get some good experience, go on to get my Masters at least. Probably be a nurse practitioner/educator. (I love students. I worked with the juniors as much as I could) My original plan was to get a Ph.D and be a research scientist. Etc. Etc. Etc. That sort of conversation

Later I learned, my parents selected the brainiac table to sit at. I was unaware until after it was all over I was sitting with our speaker, the chapter president, and various other nurses with Ph.Ds. Oh, I've never been so embarrassed. Somehow looking back on the conversations, I must have sounded like I had no idea what I was doing, but boy am I excited about it.
Our speaker had a great little presentation on the future of nursing education. Computerized, online, that sort of thing. She had done research into the best way to teach and learn with computers for nurses. It was fun to hear people encourage others to use technology, learn how to blog (me, right now) listen and create podcasts (next project) get out and on twitter and facebook (I'm there!), be connected to your communities. All of them. It made me happy. Again, I had a realization of why I love this and what I want for my life.
Plus, I got a rose.

The rest of the day was unrelated to nursing. Making jewelry with my Mom and Grandma for my brother's wedding. Going out to a fantastic restaurant with my husbands grandparents. It was hectic, but nothing to bore you with at this point.

Late Entry#1- Friday the 17th

Oops, busy busy busy.

Ordinarily I would let a few days slide, just because maybe enough cool stuff didn't happen. However, this was not the case. Friday was a cool day.
In my externship, I've primarily been working on the trauma side of the ER. Today (er, Friday) I got my first taste of the ED.
Compared to my old floor (med-surg) you move patients a lot faster in trauma, compared to the ED you get them going fast! They are in and out within hours, if all is going well. I really liked it. This is a good thing. I was enjoying trauma so much I was scared that if I ever had to work ED all my love for this department would fail. Just because it was different. However, not the case. It was yet again great. Even as I sat there doing the umptenth pelvic exam, holding a cup to catch baseball sized clots as they fell out of this woman, I knew I was where I wanted to be doing what I loved to do.

Let me illuminate a few more of the nurses I'm working with. (They're all fantastic!)
My preceptor for Friday (and a few days prior) was (fake name alert) Jacob. There are too many examples of how great a teacher and a preceptor she is. I was gaining a lot of confidence and took a few things on my own. She hadn't worked with me in a while but after she saw me in action she let me go. It was great. Very nice not to have someone breathing down my neck for once, (not that she ever did, see previous post.)

Anyway, one funny story that relaxed me about nursing.
One of our patients had a bad IV so we needed to place a new one and give her some meds through it. As an extern I can't pass meds. So I went to discharge someone else. Jacob comes out later redder than a tomato and relays this story.
I was just in there doing my thing, talking away like I normally do. Put the second IV in, pushed the med and took the IV out. Not even realizing I took the good one out and left the bad one. The husband looked at me and with a laugh asked. "Is that what you call an IV?" I was so embarrised.
Ah well, at least the baby nurse (me) knows that mistakes happen, even to the best of nurses.

I'd like to tell you about how awesome our Patient Care Manager is but I don't think there's time before I bored you all to death, however, know it's coming. I'll call her Zepham and she is simply amazing. She's not one of those, "keeps my schedule the way I like it" amazing. Even though she does that. She's amazing in her attitude, her spirit, how funny she is, and her bluntness. She's a great role model to have, and I've added her to my list.

And in other news.
I finally went out and had some drinks with my nursing friends. These students are great and I will only miss them if I lose contact with them, something I'm hoping not to do. I was driving home and recieved a phone call asking me if I wanted to go out with them. So I did.
We had a blast. The only bad part was I had just gotten off 12 hours so I was getting really tired by 10pm. By 11:30 I was beat tired, slightly glazed over and not doing much. Whatever they thought I was thinking, I was not bored but having one of the times of my life.

What is really funny is, as we were sitting there, enjoying the music and each other we saw a group of the class below us (juniors) come in. Most dressed high heels, short (very short) skirts, and probably already a little intoxicated. Our jaws dropped. Things must be a heck of a lot easier for them, because this was one of the first times we ever got to go out and we graduate in 3 weeks. I'm so glad I was on the committee that made their life easier. (I'm just a little bitter, they have no idea what we went through to get things managable for them. Sometimes a few of them can be jerks about it.)

Ah well, que sera, sera. Not much you can do about it.

Again,
I'm tired. It happens a lot, however this time it's not physical exhaustion.
I'm tired of being controlled. It seems that everytime I try to do something there's another ring to jump through. Maybe school is finally getting to me but I'm tired of all of it.
I turned in one of my last papers and did my final project today. It's really winding down now, but I still feel trapped.
I tried to have a rational conversation with my husband and instead it turned into a failed conversation. He's really defensive about something and I can't figure out what. It's making me result to emotional tactics. Something I am strongly against.
I don't have many moments to myself and I feel like I am losing even those. I still don't feel like I have control of my life. Mostly I believe it's my fault. I give into a lot of simple demands. I think I give up on my own time too easily. But I do it to help the people around me. It makes me feel selfish if someone asks me for something and I say no.
Like running. I used to run a lot, everyday at least. I gave that up because it was cutting into time I could spend with my husband. I used to run first thing in the morning, but I would have to wake up so early. I was falling alseep earlier and earlier and not getting to see my husband at all.
At this point I only wish I had a friend I could call and explain all this to. Someone who would help me analyze whats going on and help me find a solution.

Most worthless post evar!

Clinicals

There are a million things I would like to do with my life.
They're probably simple common things that everyone wishes to do in their lifetime.
None of them occur when I'm in clinical.

For those of you who are lucky enough not to be nursing students, clinical is where you work in the hospital or community setting with your instructors breathing down your neck. I've never felt like clinical sucked before now. But, heck it must be senoritis or something, I cannot get motivated to be there. There's nothing wrong with waking up at 5am for school, I've done it most of my life. Maybe thats one reason why I chose nursing. So that's not it. Its not the high pressure from the instructors, I'm fine with that. It's feeling like I have nothing to do and no reason to be there. Somehow I feel like my hands are bound when I'm in clinical. I don't have access to half the things I need to be a good nurse to my patients. The hospital we have clinicals in now (we rotate being A university that is not associated with a particular hospital) is mostly computerized charting and completely computerized medicine records (EMARs.) Well, student mode of the computer doesn't allow access to past records, and we don't get to use the EMARs (little walmart scanner-like things) because we didn't get trained on them.

So essentially, on a med-surg floor. It's pointless. I can't give meds without another nurse, and I can't read histories without access. Bah.

I feel terrible but when I'm at clinicals I wonder why I chose nursing. I've never come up with a good answer (a real one that's not cheesy) and clinicals make it that much harder.

Moving on.

I turned my portfolio into the department today. It's a 5 inch binder with every piece of paper I've ever touched in nursing school. Our University seems to think it will help us get jobs if we take it into our interviews to show them how competent we are. I wonder how many evidenced-based papers I'll be WRITING with my Bachelors... Alas, being a sarcastic, people pleaser, I took it to my ER interview. What do you know? I got the job. Back to the portfolio, if they don't have a record of it, I don't get to graduate. Ha ha, I hear that so often from the school. It will be odd once I don't have those words in the back of my head.

Happy news.

I'm sitting outside on the dinky porch that's barely attached to my cheap apartment building. I'm barefoot and happy breathing in the sunshine. I don't see the sun much. Already genetically pale (cursed Irish genes) I enjoy every chance to be outside. So Tuesdays suck because of clinical, but I get out by 3pm and that means 4 hours of sunlight!

I sort of fell asleep reading Cory Doctorow's Little Brother and got a sunburn. (BTW I am a HUGE fan of Doctorow, anyone who publishes under Creative Commons now days is for the win in my book. http://craphound.com/) If you've never read him, do it. This book (downloaded on my iphone courtesy of Stanza) is amazing. It really makes me appreciate my life and want to build dorky techy things all at the same time.

Enough plugging. I think I'll work on something else now, but not my clinical paper work. Not yet.

Monday the 13th

First, I was exhausted today.
I'm rarely exhausted. I live in a constant state of tired, but rarely am I flat out dry.
Today however...

Let's consider the factors.
Last night I had incredible back pain, still not sure why, but my loving husband decided to be nice and give me a back rub with Icy-Hot. I think we discovered I have an allergy to that product. I eventually had to take another shower just to get that burning sensation to stop. I wear I felt blisters forming.
I also made the mistake of skipping my morning coffee. Some notion of being more "healthy" and limiting my caffeine input.
What a silly notion.

Still even though I felt so worn out today, it was really great.

I'm still in my "Externship" so I haven't graduated nursing school and I am following different nurses on the floor. Today I followed a different nurse than prior. Today was the half-way point in my externship. I am required to work 144 hours. I split this up into 12, 12hour shifts MWF for the month of April. Today was day 6.
I have worked with this nurse before back when I was a PCA working on a medsurg floor. I thought she was pretty dang smart then. However, getting to witness her in her element was such a learning experience. I'll name her Robert.
Back when I was a fresh young Patient Care Assistant (nurse aide) I remember a particularly difficult patient. It wasn't that this patient needed anything, she was just very needy. It drove me crazy, and I did not want to have anything to do with that room. However, once Robert came out of that room after doing her morning assessment. She took me aside and said,
"I don't know what's going on with Mrs. ***, but lets make sure we allow for extra time when we go in there so she doesn't feel abandoned."
This took me aback, I had to really re-examine myself and my motives and priorities. Here I was thinking about the inconvenience this person was being to me and Robert was focused on making sure she felt secure in her environment. Ever since that moment I knew she was a good nurse.

Turns out I was right.
I've seen some pretty crazy things while I've been externing, from nurses ignoring symptoms because it would take more time to chart to writing down every little detail of a patient's assessment so nothing would be left out. However, following Robert was great. True, she moved very fast and never held still, even with how tired I was the day moved fast! She was focused, knowledgeable and teaching me every step of the way.

Best Moment
We had a patient today that tried to kill herself and Robert was so kind to this woman. Later, we were in the elevator together and Robert confessed to me it was like her mother all over again. I was surprised and kind of strangely honored that this "role model" nurse felt like confiding in me that her mother had attempted suicide and how that affected her life.
Normally people in role model positions try to hide all their faults so they can be held up as examples. Robert was completely human with me, and it touched my life. Thanks.

Other things...
Still not quite out of school yet. It's getting really close, and very difficult to do any of my final projects. Our school has a pretty poor policy. If we don't pass a certain test, we don't graduate. Well, a few of my classmates and I worked really hard to get this policy changed. Turns out this policy was based on a class that none of us had, so while the class and curriculum changed the policy remained. We got the policy changed that you had the opportunity to test twice before the hatchet swung. Eight people didn't pass the first time. Then six people didn't pass the second time. It breaks my heart to think that I could go through so much with this group of 38 and not see all of us make it. Another student and I were getting ready to storm the department one more time (professionally, of course) and see what we could do for these last few students.
Luckily, they had already decided to give them one more chance to test and graduate.
I'm writing this part on the 14th, because I fell asleep yesterday, so, lets move on.